


Wash, Rinse, Repeat

by Alexa_Piper



Series: The Earth Kept Spinning - a series of generally unrelated oneshots set after Phantom Planet [4]
Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: Gen, backdated fic, but basically a fic where Phantom and Valerie are trapped in a cage, maybe a bit of slight Gray Ghost if you squint
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-20
Updated: 2014-05-20
Packaged: 2021-03-01 22:00:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,601
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23824225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alexa_Piper/pseuds/Alexa_Piper
Summary: This whole kidnapping thing was getting kind of old.
Series: The Earth Kept Spinning - a series of generally unrelated oneshots set after Phantom Planet [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1716541
Comments: 2
Kudos: 31





	Wash, Rinse, Repeat

The ghost boy seemed far too comfortable for their situation.

Valerie nibbled her thumbnail thoughtfully, looking anywhere but at the glowing young man in the birdcage hanging next to hers. He was sprawled on the floor of his human-sized prison, limbs dangling through the gaps between its phase-proof bars as though there wasn't a lake full of undead piranhas five metres below them. She briefly wondered how high one of those fish could jump, but supposed that if they could reach the ghost's hands and feet, they would have done so already.

The air was thick with humidity, and Valerie leaned against the bars of her own cage in exhaustion. She tore a strip from her ragged shirt, rationalising the destruction of the garment with the thought that it had already been ruined by the thick layer of slime that coated her body. Tearing up the shirt still hurt though, testament to several years of Valerie and her father barely being able to afford the rent, let alone luxuries such as new clothing or mobile phones.

As it turned out, mobiles didn't survive ghost attacks for long anyway. Phantom's had been smashed somewhere in the fight, and by the time they were both locked snugly in their cages, the spectre had given up on trying to make the ruined iPhone work again.

Using the strip from her shirt to tie her hair up, Valerie moaned as the heat from around her neck and shoulders lifted somewhat. Using her fingers, she scraped the slime off her bare arms and legs as best she could, flicking it into the water grimly. The carnivorous ghost fish darted away from the disturbance, their scales burned by its ecto-nullifying properties, and Valerie sighed in relief as the slight breeze finally began to draw heat away from her skin.

"Sooo," the halfa in the other cage said, drawing out the word as though beginning a conversation about something trivial, such as Jack's latest exploding weapon or the newest Dead Teacher movie.

Valerie glared at the fish darting in the clear water, scratching absently at where mosquito bites were already rising on her arms; hopefully bites from ghost bloodsuckers wouldn't have any spectral effects.

The ghost sighed, waving his hands and feet as though trying to get her attention. "Vaaal, you okay?"

One of the fish leaped out of the water beneath Phantom's wiggling feet, missing by less than a ruler's length. The halfa squawked in surprise, drawing his arms and legs back inside his cage. Valerie turned her head in the opposite direction, hoping that the ghost boy would get a hint and leave her alone.

"Oh, come on!" Phantom implored, sitting up properly now that his limbs were back within the safety of his own cage. "You already gave me a black eye back at home, so you could at least talk to me now!"

Valerie snorted, fisting her fingers in her lap – she had to stop scratching those bites before she drew blood. Who knew what diseases on open wound might pick up in this place? She glanced out the corner of her eye. Sure enough, beneath the ectoburns where slime had covered his face, the right eye was swollen half-shut and coloured a delightful purple. No ghost powers meant no healing, so she would most likely be able to admire her handiwork for the duration of their imprisonment.

A strange cry rose from within the spectral jungle, and Valerie shuddered, trying not to imagine what awful creature made such a noise.

"Hey," Phantom said, his voice much softer this time, "it's okay. That was just one of those weird monkeys we saw earlier."

"I'm not scared," the huntress snapped. She immediately regretted her outburst; active powers or not, all ghosts could still sense emotions. Even half-breed freaks.

Phantom didn't call her out on her lie, simply curling his knees towards his chest and wrapping his arms around them. "I'm not scared, either," he said quietly.

They sank back into silence, and Valerie wasn't sure whether to be relieved or terrified at her companion's roundabout admittance of his fear. Didn't he get into situations like this all the time?

"Your parents'll track your ectosignature, right? They've got that boomerang thing."

The ghost nodded, resting his chin on his knees as though trying to conserve heat. Valerie frowned for a moment before remembering that he had an ice core – by curling up like that, he was undoubtedly trapping as much cool air around his body as he could.

Damned ghost powers.

"Yeah, but they might not get back here before Skulker does," he said.

The girl shifted, trying to find a more comfortable position in her cramped space. "I thought that stupid ghost hasn't posed a threat to you in years," she grumbled.

Phantom blew strands of hair out of his face. "Yeah, but he usually doesn't have such powerful weapons. I guess he really did find a vault of stuff in the Dead Zone."

Valerie ignored that last comment – she really didn't give a damn about those ancient ruins in the depths of the Ghost Zone. It was amazing that Skulker had managed to retrieve anything from that place thanks to its population of behemoths, and she highly doubted that any other ghost would be foolish enough to embark on such a risky venture.

Besides, stopping ghosts from getting dangerous tech left behind by the Ghost Zone's original inhabitants was one of Phantom's assignments. Valerie didn't have to concern herself with such matters – things in her life were already stressful enough. She didn't need more ghost hunting responsibilities on top of commencing her second year of college and working two part-time jobs.

"He wouldn't have been a problem if you hadn't been using that stupid glider," Phantom finished. "My dad already told you that it'd downright explode if you tried flying on it again!"

Valerie swung her head around to glare directly at her fellow prisoner. He glared back at her with those unnerving green eyes, as though daring her to say anything contrary.

"At least _I_ was there to fight Skulker on time!" the girl shouted, her frustration at the heat and the mosquitoes and their situation but most of all _that_ _damned ghost in front of her_ finally boiling over. "But no, you just _had_ to get there _after_ he destroyed the town library and covered everything in slime! That's all you ever do! You run around making excuses, and then need other people to come and save your freakish backside!"

Phantom flinched at her penultimate word, curling gloved fingers tighter around his shins. "If you recall, the only reason we got caught is because I was too busy saving you from your exploding glider to fight off Skulker's attacks. And I thought we agreed to never use the f-word."

"I never asked for your help!" Valerie shrieked, blinking back the heat that had risen behind her eyelids.

"You needed it," the halfa stated in a maddeningly calm voice.

" _I don't need you!_ " she screamed, furiously swatting at tears that streamed unbidden from burning eyes.

Silence followed Valerie's outburst, the very forest stunned by such harsh words.

Danny tucked his head forward so that white hair shadowed his face, curling tighter in on himself. Globs of slime still clung to his hair and clothing, quivering like jelly as they amplified the slight trembling of his body. "Sorry," he said in a voice that sounded less like a world-renowned saviour and more like the fourteen-year-old boy she had met beck when the biggest issues in their mundane little world were homework and Dash Baxter.

All of Valerie's rage was swept away in an instant, and as she watched the miserable superhero, she felt worse with every second.

How could she have been so cruel? Since Sam and Tucker left for their respective interstate universities, the only person in Danny's social life had been Valerie. They did everything together, from building weapons in his basement to marathoning _The Lord of the Rings_ and eating more ice-cream in one night than Jack Fenton could get through in a month.

The only thing they never talked about, never even _acknowledged,_ was Danny's ghost powers.

When Phantom and the Red Huntress shared the skies, they treated each other as though the whole turning-the-world-intangible thing had never happened. Sometimes she even managed to forget that it was _Danny_ fighting alongside her, shooting ghost rays out of his hands and shouting insults at their adversaries in the language of the dead. But then he'd grin that goofy grin of his, or his phone would ring with its ridiculous Ghostbusters ringtone, and Valerie would remember with a sickening jolt exactly who was behind those emerald eyes and glowing green freckles.

Valerie flinched at the stinging in her arms, realising that she had absently scratched her bites until they bled. She bit her lip, forcing her hands into the pockets of her jeans. They sat together in silence, the girl watching as red-and-orange birds flitted through the trees lining the lake. Their chicks were screaming for food, hopping uncertainly on the edges of nests, precariously close to falling.

The fish darted beneath overhanging branches, waiting for one to make a fatal mistake.

Valerie sighed, dragging her gaze away from the shore. "I'm sorry," she said, "I didn't mean that."

Danny didn't move. "Then why'd you say it?" he asked, voice muffled by his knees.

Valerie shrugged. "I don't know," she admitted.

"I think you do," the halfa retorted. "You're not the kind of person who says stuff like that without a reason."

Valerie squeezed her eyes shut. Danny was right, of course – she had wanted to hurt him, and had chosen the best way she knew how.

It was a long time before she spoke again. "Why don't we ever talk about this?"

Danny finally raised his head. "By 'this' I suspect you mean _this?_ " he asked, gesturing to his glowing body.

The huntress nodded weakly, unable to meet those horrible ghostly eyes. Danny's eyes.

The halfa rested his chin on his knees, staring at the fish beneath them. "Remember how mad you were when I revealed my secret?" he asked.

Valerie remembered – the poor halfa had received the beating of his life the first time he approached her after the disasteroid incident. What made the entire situation even worse was that he simply stood there and took the licking as though he _wanted_ it! The two teens didn't speak for weeks, and it took a full three months before the Red Huntress would deign to share the skies with Phantom without blasting him into unconsciousness.

She nodded.

"Well, I sorta got the vibe that the whole halfa thing really upset you."

"It was the whole secrets thing as well," she ground out, curling her toes as the urge to scratch the already-bleeding welts on her arms and legs grew stronger.

Danny sighed. "Yeah, that didn't go down well with my parents either. I had to talk to them about it a lot, and it was really, really awkward and upsetting. A lot of trust was gone, you know? And they really worried about the ghost fighting and all the other little things like ghost diseases and frightening new powers. And just when you started talking to me again, everyone left for their fancy universities and you were my only friend in town. I didn't want to push you away by talking about all that stuff, and I sorta didn't want to sort something out with my parents only to have to do it all over again with you the next day or something. Besides, you've always made me shut up whenever I've tried talking about my halfa life, and you don't even talk to me when I'm a ghost unless you're telling me to get out of the way."

Valerie rubbed at her eyes, a heavy blanket of guilt suddenly enveloping her in exhaustion. "I'm sorry," she said again. "I guess the whole halfa thing still unsettles me a bit. And I'm really sorry for saying those things, especially the f-word."

Valerie couldn't believe that she'd called him something so awful! When Sam broke up with the halfa after only six weeks of dating, she had hit him hard and loud with verbal abuse in the middle of the school cafeteria. The only repeated word in her attack had been 'freak', and it didn't take a genius to figure out that she called him that to inflict as much pain as possible. It didn't matter that it had been almost three years since then – if anybody called Danny that particular name, he would usually turn invisible and hightail it out of there as fast as possible.

Aside from the ghost thing, the issue of the spectacular breakup was pretty much the only other thing that Valerie never spoke to her halfa friend about.

Danny caught her gaze. "Maybe we _should_ talk about it," he suggested. "After all, whatever form I'm in, I'm still the same guy. We can't keep treating each other as friends one moment and strangers the next."

"I know," Valerie mumbled, leaning against the side of her cage closest to her friend. "Besides… I like you too much to keep fighting like this. This whole halfa thing is what makes you _you_ , and I think it's time we stop ignoring that."

Tears glistened on his burned cheeks, glowing with their own internal light. "Yeah," he croaked, tilting his head back to lean against the bars, "I'd really like that."

Valerie nodded with finality, adjusting her position and forcing her hands to stay loosely in her lap instead of returning to their scratching. "So, uh, any suggestions on how we do that?"

The halfa shrugged. "Sam and Tucker used to talk about my powers and all that crazy ghost stuff the same as they talked about everything else. I'd also use my powers a bit while we were hanging out. We'd all joke about it a bit as well." Danny scrubbed his eyes with the back of his hand. "It was still uncomfortable at first – especially since I would suddenly change into ghost form and get stuck in it when I first got my powers – but they treated it as normally as possible."

Valerie flicked another mosquito off her arm. "I think we can give that a go," she said. "Alright, Spooky, first thing's first – I'm missing work for this, so when we get home, you can buy me dinner."

The halfa's cheeks flushed a brilliant green, his glowing freckles almost drowned out by the furious blush. "Val," he choked, "are you asking me out?"

The girl shrugged. "Let's just call it platonic for now."

Danny nodded, swallowing visibly. "How about that Vietnamese place?" he asked. "We can go get something there, and then I'll help you build a new glider."

Valerie smiled. "I'd like that," she admitted, turning towards the sinking sun. Danny hummed in response, and they settled into silence again.

As the light of Skulker's rainforest lair began to fade, the Specter Speeder rose over the horizon, sending flocks of birds from the canopy in screaming bursts of colour.

The huntress turned to her friend, deciding to give this talking-about-ghost-powers-normally thing a try. "Let's clear something up, Spooky: if you _ever_ let me get shoved in a cage covered in slime again, I'll throw your immortal, regenerating backside to the piranhas."

Danny flashed her a smile – his first one since her glider had blown itself to smithereens earlier that day – and Valerie's finally felt okay again.


End file.
